Is this what Kool meant?

I was talking to a friend of mine about the Tour de France. I was disappointed that Carlos Sastre won, although he and his team executed a perfect plan for capturing the overall victory. My disappointment lies in the fact that I do not like Sastre.

Why not? Because of this. Yes, that's a fricking pacifier in his mouth, in honor of his newborn child.

The thing that I hate about Sastre's pacifier is that he carried that with him for the entire ride, in case he won. His victory celebration was planned - not pure, uncontrollable joy - which is what I truly love to see.

Something like
Stuart O'Grady's victory salute;
Or Paolo Bettini's victory salute in honor of his brother who died two weeks prior;
How about Felix Cardenas' joy;
Here's another good one;
Fabian Cancellara looking like a vampire;
Frank Schleck doing some great face-scrunching!

Joy of achieving your dreams and celebrating victory... not some pre-planned Sharpie-in-the-sock, sign-in-the-snow, cell-phone-under-the-padding celebration.

The pacifier in the mouth was the first Sastre victory I saw. First impressions DO mean a lot!

The Great American Novel

We hear time and time again about the elusive GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL. Over and over, someone on our periphery is going into seclusion, or graduating college, or sniffing glue in order to write THE GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL.

To be honest, I never had interest in writing THE GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL. In fact, I hardly care about THE GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL. I find nearly all American art - aside from music - incredibly boring.

During a visit to the Detroit Institute of Arts, I'd rather lie in the middle of the European art exhibits than meander through the American art wing.

Now, I am far from an elitist art snob. There is a lot of American art I like. There are a ton of American writings that I enjoy.

But to me, the concept of THE GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL is totally snobbish. And hence, BORING.

So does anyone actually know what the current GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL is? Is there a GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL, or is it just a concept?

Is there a GREAT RUSSIAN NOVEL? How about a GREAT CHINESE NOVEL?

I personally think it would be cool to write THE GREAT TRINIDAD/TOBAGO NOVEL - while still residing in America.

How about them apples?

Angry Red Sun

The angry red sun sneered at me from the horizon

"I woke up on the wrong side of the bed," he said to me, "I will burn your grass and kill your flowers. I will fill your day with miserable heat!"

I took a confused moment, trying not to look directly at the sun,

"You say you woke up on the wring side of the bed?" I asked.

"YES!" the sun bellowed.

I said, "But you are rising again in the East, like you have for many thousands of years. Wouldn't waking up on the wrong side of the bed mean that you'd rise in the West?"

The sun softened its harsh spotlight glow, and pondered.

"Why yes," he finally responded, "I suppose that's true! My friend, thank you for setting me straight. Have a wonderful day!"

Feeling the warm glow of the sun on my face, I realized that the day had already started wonderfully.

We have a lot of ups and downs
Out and abouts and round and rounds
The shining sun warms our bones
Feeding the day, setting the tone
Smiling faces fill empty spaces
While a finger traces winning races
The air around us, filling our lungs
With life and warmth of powerful suns
We have what we've got, no less, no more
Shall we laugh so hard our cheeks get sore?
We set ourselves up for what we get
But the future hasn't passed, it isn't written yet
Let's make our days bright sunrays
Cool blue waves on tropical bays
We have a lot of ups and downs
Out and abouts and round and rounds
But that's not the map of iron and stone
Change it as you want, change the tone.

This past week was the Register's Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa (RAGBRAI). I love rides like that. I love that your only mission each day - for an entire week - is to ride 50-80 miles. You can take as long as you want - or not.

A ride like this causes you to burn so many calories, that you can eat whatever you want, however often as you want, and STILL lose weight! How cool is it that one of the most popular roadside stops is a pink school bus, where the owner - Mr. Porkchop - sells riders an Iowa-sized porkchop?

One of the things I love about rides like RAGBRAI is riding with friends. During the evening when everyone gets together for dinner, there are stories shared that will last forever.

"I stopped in town and talked to Ben Franklin!"

"I got stuck behind a bunch of riders, and all of a sudden, I found myself in the middle of a parade! So I went with it for nearly a half mile!"

"Did you hear that someone got married during today's route?"

"Yeah! I was there!"

And not only do the stories live forever, but the memories do, too. And I love that!

But there is something to be said, too, about the quick solo bike rides. You pedal, lost in your microverse. You are completely selfish, thinking "my legs are a little tired," "Why am I breathing so hard?" "Am I going to be able to get there in time?"

And suddenly, you see something so stunningly beautiful, that you forget about you. You feel like you are truly part of the universe. You feel the warm magic of being one with everything.

I am struggling right now with getting the mileage in that I used to. It's very frustrating to feel wiped out after a 15 mile ride, when just last year, I was riding 25-50 miles. And recover takes longer these days, too. That sucks, because I want to ride long distances and have no post-ride "hangovers".

But then again, if I am able to ride 12 miles 3 days a week, then I am still given the opportunity to experience a zen moment every one of those times. And believe it or not, a zen moment can be the fix that feeds your soul.

Time For Livin'

Everything is alright.

I am a firm believer in the quote "Knowledge is Power". However, there is such a thing as "SOME Knowledge is Dangerous". And that is where I was yesterday.

The EMG in some ways was more painful, and in some ways less painful than expected. My legs are sore from the prodding they took yesterday. But on the bright side, I was told that I have only a slightly pinched nerve at the base of my spine.

The weakness in my legs were likely a result of protecting the pain in my hip. In fact, yesterday, my legs were strong again.

This is not to say that there's nothing wrong with me. We're still working on diagnosing my hip pain, but we're closer. And the diagnosis does not look as daunting as it did yesterday.

Whew! Sweet relief!

This was a warning shot across the bow, and it needs to be taken seriously.

Thank you for your well wishes. A huge weight has been lifted from my shoulders.

For Real...

Well, after all my big talk and crankiness, it's time to acknowledge the 800-pound gorilla sitting there in the corner.

Today I am scheduled for an EMG test. I've had this test a few years ago, and it was extremely painful. I am not looking forward to it. At all. Period.

But if the EMG is a dark cloud, then the results are the thunderheads looming on the horizon. I can't go on any further without admitting it - I'm scared.

For the first time in quite a while, my thoughts are so convoluted that I can't even express what's going on in my head. I first saw my oncologist to get resolution on some things going on in my body that I thought were a little strange. I totally expected him to say "yep, you are just getting old, son... everything else is peachy." Instead, he suggested that I see a neurologist for the pain I've been having in my hip. Of course, this is before getting an obligatory CT scan...

So I go to the neurologist, who points out that I've got muscle failure in my upper legs. Now this would explain why I've been getting back spasms while riding - I've been using the muscle to failure.

On a side note, the neuro also tells me that my gag reflex is slow, which could be a result of radiation treatment. The same for my perpetual dry throat and occasional difficulty swallowing.

Yep, f*cking peaches and cream here.

So because of the pain in my hip and muscle failure in my legs, I am going to get an EMG today. Afterwards, I am likely to get an MRI of my hip, spine and noggin. These things will help diagnose my hip problem (and my noggin).

Best case, I am hoping that the neuro says that I need to lose weight and get my back and abs stronger.

I can't help but hear that nagging voice in the back of my mind suggesting that it could be worse. I've had abnormal blood readings lately, which could be nothing or lupus. My hip could be nothing or MS. My gag reflex could be nothing or a tumor.

The thing that scares me most is that I am weary of fighting. Weary of drama. Weary of constantly being put in survivor mode. This is why I want Sheryl and I to be proactive with our health. I know I'm not the healthiest person alive, but I need to be healthier in order to enjoy the rest of my life. I need to be prepared to happily live another 40 years. If something negative blasts me from left field, how am I going to react this time? To be perfectly honest, I am afraid of that answer.

Stupid 800-pound gorillas. They should stay in the zoo, and not sit in the corner of the room.

So there it is. I know that I should not post this, but I hope that something positive will result from putting my fears out there.

With all that said, I've got a stupid EMG test this afternoon. It may or may not be painful, who knows? It may help diagnose my painful hip. And no matter what, I've got a need to know. I need to know what is going on.

As you can see, my mind can go loco if I dwell on the possibilities. Give me facts and hard evidence, and let's go from there.

For real, can we stop the carousel?

When I Got Cool...

I grabbed my bike, and headed to the studio to meet Gregor, who was giving me guitar lessons in return for ghost writing his autobiography.

Traffic was actually light, and I bolted between red lights and stop signs, barely working up a sweat in the cool dawn.

Gregor slept during the day, no doubt dreaming up his amazing aural landscapes and visual palettes. When he returned from Operation Desert Storm, the chilling agony that laid behind his eyes purged itself through art and music.

One would expect his haunting visions to manifest themselves through dark and deadly forms of imagination, but surprisingly, his art and music were beautiful, rich and deep. We're not talking Barry Manilow love songs, mind you, but soulful and insightful works.

Last year, Gregor decided to put his story into book form. Although he was an artist and musician, he realized that he was too close to the story and needed an objective eye to focus on it. He put an ad on Craigslist, and apparently, I was the first to respond.

At the interview, Gregor and I realized that we had a lot in common. We shared a love for the arts - he could paint and play music, and I loved looking at art and listening to music. We became quick friends, and came to an agreement for writing the book.

Part of the agreement was that Gregor and I would work in the morning. He tended to stay up all night, fueled by Led Zeppelin, Foo Fighters, Iron Maiden, and Crystal Method, painting on floor to ceiling canvases in preparation for his latest exhibit.

In order to wind down after painting, he would have me come over to his studio, and we would have a couple of drinks - I would drink coffee-flavored water, and he would drink Absinthe - fresh off its' 100 year ban. We would work together for a couple of hours, and I would go to my "real job", and transcribe my notes at home later on.

As I said, Gregor and I quickly became friends. But business was business, and I had to ensure I was being paid fairly for the work I was doing. When Gregor came up short on cash one week, we decided to lower my fee, but only if he agreed to give me guitar lessons once a week.

It was Friday, and I was stoked. I work 10 hour shifts four times a week. Today was the first day of my weekend, and the summer morning was starting beautifully.

(more to come...?)

Stop the Carousel, I Wanna Get Off

Today is just one of those beautiful summer days that I want get off the carousel and do some exploring.

I sat on the deck as the sun was coming up, and was overwhelmed with the childhood feelings of summer mornings. I am holding onto that feeling for as long as I can, because I know it will be gone far too soon.

Sometimes you get so caught up in the carousel of every day life and sometimes you happen to realize it. Instead of air conditioning, I want summer breeze blowing across my skin. Instead of sitting at a desk, I want to be carelessly riding my bike wherever I want to be at that moment. I don't want to think about my doctor appointments, rather I want to run through the woods, watching the birds fly by overhead and the sun peek in and out from behind branches.

Yeah, stop the carousel, I wanna step off.

I don't want to watch or read the news. I want childhood ignorance ruled by stats on the back of baseball cards. I want to splash around in a pool, not caring how much water is spilled over the edge. I would love to lie on the grass, and watch the clouds roll lazily by, and not worry about who is going to cut that grass or water the flowers. I want to run down the ice cream man, eagerly searching the menu for a Good Humor Strawberry Shortcake bar instead of hiding from the Postman and the bills he'll bring.

Really, I'm not asking for much - just one day. One amazing childhood summer day.

Needles on my brain...

I am seething right now about Le Tour... The Grand Boucle has sufferred a HUGE blow with Ricardo Ricco returning a positive piss test.

I have stated in the past that I cannot blame cyclists for their past dirty deeds. Eric Zabel, Frankie Andreu, and Bjarne Riis have all admitted to doping in the 90s. Again, I can't blame them. That was the culture of cycling in the 90s.

However, cycling has worked hard to clean up its reputation. The French have bitched that they have not won much of anything in Le Tour in recent years because everyone who has won has doped. But not the French! Blah blah blah...

Team CSC, Discovery Channel (now Astana), Team High Road (now Team Columbia) and Slipstream-Chipotle (now Garmin-Chipotle) have taken a stance on doping within their teams. They have upgraded all testing, and made their practices transparent. And guess who has had most of the success this year overall??

So Dr. Rasmus Damsgaard - the man who has implemented the strict doping controls with CSC and other teams - came out and said that he is concerned about the doping controls in this years' Tour. He feels that they are not stringent enough, and focus mainly on the Spanish riders.

Sure enough, two Spanish riders have already been kicked out of the Tour for doping this year. But the biggest blow was today when young hotshot jackass Ricardo Ricco was popped for doping. His team, Saunier-Duval, was the top team in Tour winnings so far this year.

Guess what? Ricco isn't Spanish... but he's not French, either. He's Italian! BUT... Saunier-Duval is a SPANISH TEAM! Word is that Saunier-Duval didn't even start the race today. They tucked their tails and packed their shit and left France.

I know that I'm rambling. There is so much in my head about this crap that I need to get out. I'll try to summarize:

Cycling is trying to clean up. CSC, Garmin and Columbia are trying to become examples of clean riding. Ironically, none of these teams are French.

Idiots are still trying to beat the system, and the system is enabling them to do it.

But a few got caught, which is good and bad.

It's good because it shows that the hole-laden net of controls CAN work when it wants to.

It's bad because this happens every year, and people are getting good and tired of people cheating.

I understand that there is a ton of pressure to compete on a high level. I understand that people are given the ability to cheat. But what people don't understand - what sportsmen cannot seem to get a grip on (especially when mo' money is involved!) - is that they ARE heroes to kids and others who seek inspiration.

Too bad. If you can't handle it, then get out of the business. It is a necessary evil.

DOPING IS NOT.

Thanks a lot, Ricardo Ricco, for f*cking up another opportunity for a sport that I love to clean up its image. Your cocky-ass, mouth-shooting arrogance just bit you in the ass more than the bite of the needle. If your B sample comes back positive, you will be suspended for two years. You will come back, and I won't care. Hopefully, no one will.

Where's that ego of yours now?

Yeah, I'm not only seething, but a little bitter, too... :)

Life and Death Comes Down to Health

"I am health, I am strength, I am success and I am abundance. That is my nature, and that is what I am."

"I am slim, trim, lean and thin."

These are my affirmations, which I typically recite in the shower each day. I've been saying the first one for a couple of years, and it has essentially been true. The latter one, however, I'm still working on. I figure if I say it enough, I will believe it.

This weekend, I had an experience that had only happened to me twice before. I thought there was something SERIOUSLY wrong with me. I also call this an "Oh f*ck! moment".

One day, while I was going through chemo, I had decided to binge on pizza. Considering that pizza itself is slow to digest, and the chemo I was on caused constipation, I put myself into a world of hurt. That night, while my belly was bloated, my sciatica was triggered, and I began having pain in places I never had pain before.

That was the first time I seriously thought I was going to die.

The next time was this past Halloween. I awoke in the middle of the night with intense pain in my back and right shoulder. Motrin barely touched the pain, and I was afraid that soemthing was going on that I couldn't overcome. I knew it wasn't a heart attack, because that would have been left-side pain...

I tend to have problems with my chest, back and right shoulder as a result of a mountain biking crash 10+ years ago. I separated my shoulder, as well as the cartilage in my back and sternum. And sure enough, I can tell when the weather changes...

In any case, I had slept funny earlier that day, and aggravated my shoulder and back. Time took care of fixing that.

This weekend, I awoke in the middle of the night with intense pain in my hip and leg. I had been having problems with my hip for about a year, but the doc can't seem to find anything wrong. So I tried stretching and massaging the pain away. Eventually, the Motrin kicked in, and I was able to go back to bed.

While I was up, though, the thought popped into my mind that I might have to get my hip replaced. And there was no way that would be possible with me being as overweight as I am. So I was shocked into action, and am now focusing on being better to myself and my body.

I'm not fooling myself. I know it's going to be a long, gradual road, but I have GOT to get healthier.

"I am slim, trim, lean and thin."

VIVE Le TOUR!

For me, July means Le Tour de France.

It also brings forth memories of my cycling guru - Uncle Jack ("UJ").

As a kid, I really enjoyed the attention given to me from my youngest aunts and uncles - Aunt Michelle, Uncle Ron and Uncle Jack. They were the coolest, and they are the model for what I want to be for my nieces and nephews.

I really loved riding my bike, and one day, I was floored when UJ rode his bike over to our house, and he and I rode through the neighborhood. Being a lil one at the time, I felt like we had ridden miles together, yet as I look back from an adult point of view, it was merely a few blocks.

Nonetheless, this is an extremely vivid memory from my childhood.

That day, UJ became my cycling guru.

Time passed, and we drifted in different directions. I stopped riding bikes when I got my license, only starting up again in my late 20's.

As I began riding again, I found my old memories drawing me back to UJ. We started e-mailing, sharing riding stories and a passion for cycling as adults.

Soon, we became semi-regulars in each others' life again.

Once I bought my house, I was located a short distance from UJ and family. They invited me over for dinner, and I invited them over for parties.

UJ's ability to cycle has been affected over the years, so when I signed up for my 2nd major ride - a 32-miler - UJ let me borrow his road bike. Man, the ride was SO much easier with that rather than with my mountain bike!!

Around the same time, Lance Armstrong started winning Le Tour, and UJ and I would call and e-mail each other in excitement -

"Did you see Lance give Ullrich 'the look'?" he asked me.

"No, I need to watch it tonight!"

"Oh, man," UJ would say, "Lance totally f'ed with Jan's head!"

Like little kids, we were.

UJ and his family moved to North Carolina. We would talk about doing the Assault on Mt. Mitchell, knowing full well that we never would.

And somehow, we finally got the chance to watch a few stages of the Tour together. We did the same the following year. And the year after that. It was bliss.

It has been a couple of years since then, yet me and UJ still e-mail back and forth, and I have no doubt that he wishes that I was there watching with him - just as much as I do.

Life goes on, and things change. You can say that cycling isn't a sport and bitch about the Tour being on TV for an entire month, but it's our time together - my cycling guru of 30+ years and mine - whether we see each other or not.

VIVE Le TOUR!